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Revision and discussion
Nobody is perfect, at least we are doing mistakes during work. As more and more experts find their way to antbase.net, we get most valuable hints to mistakes that happened during identification of ants. Of course we try our best to follow your suggestions.



Dear colleagues:

Congratulations on launching the Asian antbase. It promises to be a fantastic resource for a little known part of the world of ants. I'm especially pleased to see the plan to post works on the ecology of the incredibly rich fauna of Borneo, etc.

You may wish to add the California Academy of Science Antweb to the links
http://www.antweb.org/california.jsp.

It currently has high-resolution images of all California ants and some Madagascar ants.
I really look forward to the growth of this site. James C. Trager
Shaw Nature Reserve
Missouri USA



Donat Agosti, American Museum of Natural History, wrote:

Lieber Martin

.....
Da sind noch ein oder zwei Fehler:
Eurhopalothrix platisgnama sollte wahrscheinlich
Eurhopalothrix platisquama heißen.

Pachycondyla lecwenhoeki
Pachycondyla leeuwenhoeki heißen?

Probier doch mal die links aus, und dann findest Du was laeuft, und was nicht.

Gruss, Donat

Answer: Ja, Du hast recht. Vielen Dank fuer Deine Hilfe!Wir haben den Fehler natuerlich gleich verbessert.



Barry Bolton, The Natural History Museum London wrote:

Dear Martin,

I have been looking at the dacetine ants in your Poring Ants website. Very good, but I have a couple of comments.
  1. Smithistruma is a junior synonym of Pyramica, not a subgenus. I spent a lot of time in my papers of 1999 and 2000 pointing this out. Smithistruma was a polyphyletic assemblage.
  2. I recognise many of the numbered Strumigenys species you show but you appear to have the commen species S. signeae more than once. Have you tried to identify the species with my 2000 key? There are 20 species recorded from Poring Hot Springs(plus many more from elsewhere in Borneo that may also occur at Poring). The 20 recorded Poring Strumigenys species are:
    arrogantia, bryanti, doriae, edaragona, gloriosa, godeffroyi, hastur, hekate, indigatrix, inhonesta, juliae, koningsbergeri, kraepelini, nanzanensis, perturba, propinqua, rofocala, rotogenys, signeae, strenosa.
Best regards
Barry

Answer: Thank you very much for your advice! We have already identified some of the specimens and there will be some more Strumigenys photos, soon.



John S. LaPolla, Rutgers University wrote:

.... I wanted to point out however, that the ant you have pictured as Acropyga acutiventris is not. I suspect that the ant pictured is in fact a Pseudolasius, though I would need to look at the specimen(s) to be absolutely certain. Based on what I think are the eyes the specimen looks like a Pseudolasius. If you would like I'd be happy to look at the specimen(s). I can also send you a reprint on a paper I wrote which has some diagnostic characters separating Acropyga and Pseudolasius. Let me know.

Sincerely,
John LaPolla



Roberto A. Keller, American Museum of Natural History tells us:

...I want to bring your attention to the specimen you show under the name Probolomyrmex 1. It does not seems to me to belong to Probolomyrmex, due to the lack of a fronto-clypeal shelf where the antennas insert. In typical Probolomyrmex, the mandibles are not visible in frontal view because they are completely concealed by this structure. In the specimen you show the mandibles are clearly visible and the antennal sockets just reach the anterior border of the head capsule.

One possibility is that you have a small species of Cerapachys, although I agree that the general habitus is quite different form what you would expect from Cerapachys. The best way to asses this is by looking for the well define Cerapachyinae characteristics:
1) is the pygidium flattened and does it bears a row of spines (see Bolton 1994. Ident. Guide to the Ant Genera of the World);
2) does the metapleural gland orifice is concealed by a cuticular flange? (this may be dificult to see given the specimen size);
3) Is the premental shield (i.e., ventral part of the labium) concealed by the stipes and labrum while the mouthparts are closed? I discovered this last character during my survey of Poneroid complex phylogeny and it is now formally used by Bolton in his latest synoptic classification (Bolton. 2003. Synopsis & Classification of Formicidae. Memoirs of the American Entomological Institute 71. 370pp). This last character defines the whole Doryline section, rather than just the Cerapachyinae.

If your specimen(s) lacks these characters (i.e., if it is not a Cerapachys), you may have a very interesting and important ant. I will greatly appreciate if you can confirm this to me.

On a shorter note. Is there any reason why you are not regarding Odontoponera denticulata as a junior synonym of Odontoponera transversa?

Best regards,
Roberto

Answers:

Of course we check all these specimens as soon as practicable! Access to these specimens is now only possible from this site. And we changed links to "Odontoponera denticulata", which is of course a junior synonym of Odontoponera transversa!

Thank you very much!
Martin